Yeah! We're doing shots!

As I mentioned, I had tentative plans to meet up with some friends from Xela in Semuc Champey sometime around the 8th of June.  Prior to arrival in Guatemala, the entirety of my research had consisted of a 20 minute conversation with a guy named "Squirrel" about a place that had a french-sounding name that I just had to visit.  Turns out this was it.  I hopped off the bus in the main intersection in town and started walking, towards what I hoped was the Zephyr Lodge, a place highly recommended by my trusty guidebook.  As I walked down the driveway, I heard someone yell out "Fuck yeah!  We´re doing shots!".  Seemed a bit out of place, as I hadn´t heard any English since I left Xela about a week ago, and we were in the middle of the jungle.

Turns out that Zephyr was party central and no one told me.  It was filled with a bunch of shirtless 19 and 20 year olds blasting Macklemore on a tiny set of speakers and dancing around.  The girl at the front desk greeted me first in English, and told me that there was only one bed left and that they were expecting quite a party tonight.  I hung around in the common area checking email for about 30 minutes until I couldn´t stand it anymore.  I told the nice girl that I had to leave and found a cheapo, sweaty hotel in town for $5 a night.  I´m not here to have fun, damnit!

El Retiro hostel

Anyway, the next day I tried my luck at the hostel where Anna & Alice from Xela would be staying, and found a nice little loft room for about the same price.  Of course, as I was taking my bag to my "room", I saw my buddy Olaf (Hola HOlaf!) sitting down by the river. Turns out that he´d been here for a few days and was leaving in the morning.  Olaf is a Dutch computer programmer, who knows more about everything in the world than I do (in a very non-obnoxious way).  He might be the most socially well-adjusted computer programmer in existence, and it was great running into him.  We spend the afternoon sitting in hammocks and trying to come up with new words in English for me to teach him.  When he casually accused something I said of having a "pejorative connotation" I gave up.

Anyway, we spent the night having a somewhat quiet round of beers with the folks at the hostel and I finally started to feel a bit better about this place.  

**None of these pictures are mine**